


but it's all too much

by littleboxes



Category: Julie and The Phantoms (TV)
Genre: Alex Has Anxiety (Julie and The Phantoms), Angst, Anxiety Attacks, Canonical Character Death, Existential Crisis, Gen, Heavy Angst, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, Mild Blood, Panic, alex dies and does not. handle it well
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-16
Updated: 2020-10-16
Packaged: 2021-03-09 00:22:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,012
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27045679
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/littleboxes/pseuds/littleboxes
Summary: Alex has a bad time, post-death
Relationships: Alex & Reggie (Julie and The Phantoms)
Comments: 14
Kudos: 186





	but it's all too much

**Author's Note:**

> oh it's big time projection time onto alex "anxious disaster rep" jatp  
> title is from overwhelmed by royal & the serpent (an alex song)

Alex wakes up. He wakes up, and looks down, and sees his own chest. His chest, and his hoodie, his hoodie that has blood and vomit down the front of it, and for a second he just stares, confused, until there’s a distressed noise from his left and he looks to the side and sees Reggie looking at him with wide eyes. 

Reggie, who is lying on a gurney and floating above his own body, and Luke’s beside him, confusion and horror dawning on his face. 

Alex can feel himself starting to panic and his breathing starts to quicken except then he realizes that it _isn’t_ , that he can’t feel his heart beating in his chest, anymore, and his breathing _should_ be quickening but all he has to prove that is the _memory of being alive_. 

Even as he does/doesn’t start to panic, he can’t stop looking at his own face.

It’s so _wrong_ , it’s like staring into a mirror for too long except it’s not a mirror, it’s his _face_ , and he looks- he looks _bad_ , he’s never really understood how someone’s face can look twisted in pain until right now, and there’s blood trailing from his mouth and Alex is _dead_ and his friends are _dead_ and they’re _looking at their own bodies_ -

He feels someone tug on his arm, and yanks his head up to see Reggie motioning him upward. As he does, Alex starts to feel weightless, and his stomach swoops like he’s on a rollercoaster, except it doesn’t, it’s just the memory of that feeling, because Alex _doesn’t have a body anymore_. 

They float up and out of the ambulance- _We didn’t even make it to the hospital_ \- and as his body passes through the ceiling he doesn’t even feel it, and then they’re not above the ambulance anymore.

He, Reggie, and Luke are standing in a dark room, at first he thinks they’re just in the night sky but when he looks down there aren’t any city lights, just darkness. 

He looks around but he can’t even see the walls, just his friends’ faces, and he can see the realization of what happened dawning on their faces, and all he wants is to curl up and- and normally, when his anxiety spikes like this, he’d wish to die, but now he’s _dead_ , and they’re in some kind of _void_ , and what if this is just where they’re going to be forever? Stuck in a black void with only each other-?

Alex’s breath hitches because what if they don’t stay together? They’re not in heaven, or hell, and frankly Alex just doesn’t think he can process either of those facts right now, because his faith in god got a lot more complicated after he told his parents he was gay but he’d spent years going to church and he’s _standing in a black void crying with his friends_ because he’s _dead_ and what if they leave? What if something takes them away? 

His hands are shaking- actually, shaking, and Alex doesn’t know why his hands can still shake when he doesn’t feel the need to breathe anymore, when he can’t feel it when his heart beats; technically he can’t even hyperventilate anymore, do ghosts have nervous systems but not circulatory systems? Can that even happen? 

_Fuck_ , Alex should’ve paid more attention in biology, this isn’t fair, death is supposed to be _peaceful_ , death is supposed to have _answers_ , but instead he’s in a weird dark room having a panic attack and _what if he he has a panic attack for eternity?_

He’s not sure how much time has passed exactly when he feels an arm around his shoulder and hears Luke talking to him, but Alex can’t stop thinking about the implications of eternity, that- it’s stupid, but eternity’s _forever_ , and what is Alex supposed to do for forever? 

What about his sister, oh god, he starts crying in earnest again, because Sam’s only ten and now she’s all alone and his parents probably think he’s in hell and Alex won’t ever be able to _see them again_ and she’s going to grow up without him and Alex is going to stay _seventeen forever_ , unless ghosts age, but Alex has no idea how that works, because ghosts aren’t supposed to be real, but now he’s one, and he doesn’t know any of the rules!

“-dude, remember, you gotta take deep breaths? Alex, bro, come on, deep breaths-”

Alex tries to breathe, but then that just makes him think about the fact that he doesn’t have _lungs anymore_ , because he’s _dead_ \- and oh god, does Bobby know? They just left him, they were gonna play the Orpheum, oh no-,

“Luke, dude, I got this-”

Alex’s panic is interrupted by two arms wrapping around him and squeezing. It’s Reggie, and Alex buries his face in his friend’s shoulder and breathes in, and instead of focusing on the weird discomfort of breathing as a muscle memory rather than necessity, he gets distracted by the smell of Reggie’s jacket- leather, sweat, and that weird, so-called “unscented” lotion that _does_ have a smell, Alex just doesn't _know what it is_ , and just because it isn’t floral doesn’t mean it’s _unscented, Luke, it’s false advertising and now it’s going to haunt me forever!_

(Turns out Alex does, and doesn’t, have bigger things to haunt him forever-)

After a little bit, Alex can feel Luke join the hug as well, and by the sound of it, Alex isn’t the only one crying anymore, and the sound of it reassures him. He’s not alone. They’re not alone. They’ll figure out death like they’ve figured out everything else, and it’ll be fine. 

It has to. 

(It is fine, relatively. Then the dark room disappears, and they’re in their studio but it’s all wrong, and a girl screams at them. Then Alex learns they’ve been crying in a dark room for _twenty-five years_ , and the only thing that saves him from another spiral is Luke and Reggie framing him as the only crier, which _excuse you_ -)

**Author's Note:**

> comments are appreciated <3


End file.
